Food warmers for maintaining precooked food at serving temperature are well known in the art. Two general types of these food warmers exist. The first is a portable, self contained food station either mounted on wheels or small enough for table top use. The second is a drop-in individual warmer well generally used with a pre-existing cabinet which is provided with a cut out in the counter top.
Because the portable, self contained food stations are often build by one manufacturer, the warmer wells can simply be fabricated integrally with the counter top to eliminate any sanitary problems associated with the connection between the warmer well and the counter top.
The drop-in individual warmer wells, however, cannot be manufactured integrally with the counter tops. The warmer wells are added to pre-existing cabinets by dropping the warmer well into the cut out. Thus, care must be taken to ensure that the connection between the warmer well and the counter top is sufficiently sealed to avoid any sanitary problems such as leakage of water or foodstuffs. This need is exemplified in many local health department codes regulating such seals.
In order to satisfy such sanitary regulations, sealing means of the prior art have sacrificed durability and ease of installation and removal of the drop-ins. For example, in one type seen in the prior art, stud welds are applied to the flange of the drop-ins which attached to holes or slots provided in the cabinets.
Use of such stud welds has two drawbacks. The stud welds often shear and break off during installation or removal of the drop-ins. In addition, the cabinets in which the drop-ins are placed must be fabricated with holes or slots to accept the stud welds.
In another type of sealing means seen in the prior art, a twist clamp is slot welded to the drop-in and twisted to engaged the cabinet in installation. While this type of sealing means avoids the breach off problems of the stud welds, they provide unsatisfactory clamping force against the cabinet In addition, installation is virtually permanent because reversing the twisted on clamp often destroys the twist clamps.
In still another type of sealing means seen in the prior art, a hinge is provided with one side of the hinge attached to the drop-in The other side of the hinge is secured to the counter top by a screw that threads through a bolt contained in the movable side of the hinge. An example of this can be seen in U.S. Pat. No. 3,361,089.
The problem with this hinge arrangement is that the screw head is accessed from the inside of the drop-in, and thus extends through a hole in the drop-in. This creates a new sanitary problem in that food products and water can find their way through this hole.
Accordingly, what is needed is a simple, inexpensive sealing means which is not susceptible to breakage or infringement of sanitary considerations and which allows ease of both installation and removal of the drop-ins.